There are some things you might have expected to learn from the hacking of the Clinton campaign and Democratic party emails – party strategies, for example, and political indiscretions. And there are some things you probably wouldn’t have expected to discover – such as the fact that one of America’s most successful pop-punk singers had emailed the chairman of Clinton’s campaign about their mutual interest in UFOs.

The latest batch of emails posted by WikiLeaks reveal that former Blink-182 frontman Tom DeLonge had been emailing John Podesta, the chair of the campaign, about their mutual interest in life beyond this planet and UFOs. Podesta – a former chief of staff for former president Bill Clinton and counsellor to Barack Obama – has long been public about his belief the government should declassify information it holds about extraterrestrial life.

In 2015, DeLonge wrote to Podesta saying he wanted to introduce him to two “very ‘important’ people” to discuss their shared interest. “I think you will find them very interesting, as they were principal leadership relating to our sensitive topic,” he wrote. “Both were in charge of most fragile divisions, as it relates to classified science and DOD [Department of Defence] topics. In other words, these are A-Level officials. Worth our time, and as well the investment to bring all the way out to you.”

In another email, sent this year, he tells Podesta he has been in touch with a former official involved in the Roswell incident – in which, it is claimed, the US government covered up the its recovery of an alien ship in New Mexico in 1947. The government said it was a weather balloon. DeLonge said he had been in discussions with Maj Gen William McCasland, who had a long career in the US air force, specialising in matters pertaining to space. “He mentioned he’s a ‘skeptic’, he’s not … He just has to say that out loud, but he is very, very aware – as he was in charge of all of the stuff,” DeLonge wrote. “When Roswell crashed, they shipped it to the laboratory at Wright Patterson air force base. Gen McCasland was in charge of that exact laboratory up to a couple years ago.”